DOCSLIB.ORG

Hermeneutics, Rhetoric and Informal Logic

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Hermeneutics, Rhetoric and Informal Logic University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor OSSA Conference Archive OSSA 3 May 15th, 9:00 AM - May 17th, 5:00 PM Hermeneutics, rhetoric and informal logic Elizabeth Skakoon McMaster University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive Part of the Philosophy Commons Skakoon, Elizabeth, "Hermeneutics, rhetoric and informal logic" (1999). OSSA Conference Archive. 52. https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive/OSSA3/papersandcommentaries/52 This Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Conferences and Conference Proceedings at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in OSSA Conference Archive by an authorized conference organizer of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Title: Hermeneutics, Rhetoric and Informal Logic Author: Elizabeth Skakoon Response to this paper by: James Crosswhite (c)2000 Elizabeth Skakoon 1. Introduction The scientific method is used to determine objective truths of the natural world, and is effective at arriving at such 'objective' truths provided that its subject matter is suitable to this method of inquiry. Unfortunately, with the scientific method comes the attitude of scientism which tells us to reject any notion of truth that cannot be arrived at 'objectively'. Problems occur, however, when we try to apply our scientific standards of truth to our 'life world', and these problems are most evident in the human sciences. Hans Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur are concerned with such problems and have argued in their writings that a hermeneutical theory is an alternative to a scientific inquiry when humanity itself is the subject. Instead of an 'objectively' derived truth that corresponds to reality, hermeneutical inquiry seeks to understand and interpret our world. It is this rejection of the correspondence theory of truth that has aligned hermeneutics with rhetoric. According to Gadamer, in absence of demonstrable truth, the persuasion and acceptance which rhetoric seeks is "obviously as much the aim and measure of understanding and interpretation"(Gadamer 1977: 24). Thus hermeneutical theory has had a long association with rhetoric since "the theoretical tools of the art of interpretation (hermeneutics) have been to a large extent borrowed from rhetoric"(Gadamer 1977: 24). In light of recent developments in the study of argumentation, I think it may be time to reevaluate the association of hermeneutics with rhetoric. Another method of inquiry has evolved, one which may prove to be closer to the aims of the hermeneutical project rather than rhetoric itself. The field to which I refer is informal logic. Since there is no one standard theory of informal logic, I have chosen the writings of Ralph Johnson, a well respected and veteran member in the informal logic field. Using his paper, Argumentative Space: Logical and Rhetorical Approaches, I will outline the differences between informal logic and rhetoric, and suggest that after an analysis of these differences, informal logic appears to be closer to hermeneutics in its overall structure and telos than rhetoric. Before doing so, however, more needs to be said about the connections between hermeneutics and rhetoric. 2.Hermeneutics and Rhetoric As mentioned in the introduction, hermeneutical theory does not wish to demonstrate 'truth', rather, it seeks to understand our life world. On the topic of hermeneutical understanding, Ricoeur writes, "The first function of understanding is to orientate us in a situation. So understanding is not concerned with grasping a fact but with apprehending a possibility of being" (Ricoeur 1994: 56). It is our existence within culture, language, and history that gives us a situatedness; however, it does not follow that we are completely determined by our situation. It is this situatedness that opens us to new possibilities. These possibilities of being can be contained within a text, or within a dialogue, and we must go through the process of understanding and interpreting in order to grasp the meaning of these other modes of being. Gadamer writes that this process involves, "working out appropriate projections, anticipatory in nature, to be confirmed "by the things" themselves, is the constant task of understanding"(Gadamer 1997: 267). Part of the idea of situatedness are the concepts of 'horizon' and the 'fusion of horizons'. On this subject Ricoeur writes, "wherever there is a situation, there is an horizon which can be contracted or enlarged"(Ricoeur 1994: 62). Since one's situatedness is primarily responsible for one's horizon, when we communicate with another or with a text there is a "fusion of horizons", a common ground between oneself and another is found, and new possible ways of being emerge. There exists an ethical element in this concept as well. Although I will return to this point later in this paper, for now it will suffice to say that enlarging one's horizon can be seen as an 'ethical move'. It is understood by Gadamer and Ricoeur that humans seek to understand each other and their life worlds. This understanding is achieved through an openness to the possible ways of being. Hermeneutics tends to regard quite favourably those who are willing to enlarge their horizon and reevaluate their respective positions. The limits of one's horizon are determined by one's prejudices. It is important to note, however, that Gadamer uses the word with its original intention, literally, a prejudgement. Due to our situatedness, when we try to discern a new possible way of being, the open stance that we must take "includes our situating the other meaning in relation to the whole of our own meanings or ourselves in relation to it"(Gadamer 1997: 267). In this sense, prejudice does not have a negative connotation because without some prejudices, we would not have the possibility of any knowledge whatsoever, as there would no way to relate the alien to the familiar. Our openness to the text "involves neither a neutrality with respect to content, nor the extinction of one's self, but the foregrounding and appropriation of one's own fore meanings and prejudices" (Gadamer 1997: 268). These foremeanings and prejudices cannot and should not dictate the understanding one has of the text or the speaker. According to Gadamer, "the important thing is to be aware of one's own bias, so that the text can present itself in all its otherness and thus assert its own truth against one's own foremeanings"(Gadamer 1997: 269). Relating Gadamer's concept of prejudice with that of a horizon, when we are engaged in the hermeneutical act of understanding and interpreting, our prejudices provide the possibility for the fusion of horizons, but ultimately, if a new possibility of being is to be realized, these prejudices must accommodate the new, extended horizon. This new horizon does not dismiss the old prejudices, as it "is continually in the process of being formed because we are continually having to test all our prejudices" (Gadamer 1997: 306). When extending our horizons and reassessing our prejudices, the understanding occurs through language, "language is the universal medium in which understanding occurs. Understanding occurs in interpreting"(Gadamer 1997: 389), yet it is important to note that this does not entail linguistic relativism, but rather a universalism. Gadamer writes: Any language in which we live is infinite in this sense, and it is completely mistaken to infer that reason is fragmented because there are various languages. Just the opposite is the case. Precisely through our finitude, the particularity of our being, which is evident even in the variety of language, the infinite dialogue is opened in the direction of the truth that we are (Gadamer 1977:16). Language does not 'trap' us; rather, it is the medium through which Being is revealed. Returning to the scientific method and its claim to objective 'truth', we can see that even science must engage in understanding and interpretation before explanation can be attempted because it also is necessarily language dependent. What then happens to our all important concept of 'truth' if we do not have an 'objective' method to help us find our footing against a relativistic critique? In chapter two of his book The Hermeneutics of PostModernity, Gary Madison offers his interpretation of Gadamerian 'criteria' to follow when trying to determine the truth of an interpretation. Briefly, they are as follows: coherence, comprehensiveness, penetration, thoroughness, appropriateness, contextuality, agreement, suggestiveness, and potential (Madison 1990: 30). When one argues for the validity of a particular interpretation, "one adduces reasons, i.e. one appeals to certain commonly or widely accepted principles and maintains that interpretation 1 as opposed to interpretation 2, more faithfully embodies such principles"(Madison 1990: 32). Thus, here lies the first connection with rhetoric; acceptance as against truth. Instead of demonstratively proving or logically deducing the 'truth' of a given position, hermeneutical theory appeals to these 'criteria', and thus one is persuaded by the truth of a particular interpretation when the interpretation embodies these principles. This does not mean, however, that acceptance is only necessary and sufficient for the 'truth' of a given interpretation in the sense that one group's acceptance of an interpretation automatically renders it true. This would imply a sort of relativism that hermeneutics wants to avoid. To answer this charge, we must
Load more

Recommended publications
  • John P. Burgess Department of Philosophy Princeton University Princeton, NJ 08544-1006, USA [email protected]
    John P. Burgess Department of Philosophy Princeton University Princeton, NJ 08544-1006, USA [email protected] LOGIC & PHILOSOPHICAL METHODOLOGY Introduction For present purposes “logic” will be understood to mean the subject whose development is described in Kneale & Kneale [1961] and of which a concise history is given in Scholz [1961]. As the terminological discussion at the beginning of the latter reference makes clear, this subject has at different times been known by different names, “analytics” and “organon” and “dialectic”, while inversely the name “logic” has at different times been applied much more broadly and loosely than it will be here. At certain times and in certain places — perhaps especially in Germany from the days of Kant through the days of Hegel — the label has come to be used so very broadly and loosely as to threaten to take in nearly the whole of metaphysics and epistemology. Logic in our sense has often been distinguished from “logic” in other, sometimes unmanageably broad and loose, senses by adding the adjectives “formal” or “deductive”. The scope of the art and science of logic, once one gets beyond elementary logic of the kind covered in introductory textbooks, is indicated by two other standard references, the Handbooks of mathematical and philosophical logic, Barwise [1977] and Gabbay & Guenthner [1983-89], though the latter includes also parts that are identified as applications of logic rather than logic proper. The term “philosophical logic” as currently used, for instance, in the Journal of Philosophical Logic, is a near-synonym for “nonclassical logic”. There is an older use of the term as a near-synonym for “philosophy of language”.
    [Show full text]
  • On the Relation of Informal to Formal Logic
    University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor OSSA Conference Archive OSSA 2 May 15th, 9:00 AM - May 17th, 5:00 PM On the Relation of Informal to Formal Logic Dale Jacquette The Pensylvania State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive Part of the Philosophy Commons Jacquette, Dale, "On the Relation of Informal to Formal Logic" (1997). OSSA Conference Archive. 60. https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive/OSSA2/papersandcommentaries/60 This Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Conferences and Conference Proceedings at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in OSSA Conference Archive by an authorized conference organizer of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ON THE RELATION OF INFORMAL TO FORMAL LOGIC Dale Jacquette Department of Philosophy The Pennsylvania State University ©1998, Dale Jacquette Abstract: The distinction between formal and informal logic is clarified as a prelude to considering their ideal relation. Aristotle's syllogistic describes forms of valid inference, and is in that sense a formal logic. Yet the square of opposition and rules of middle term distribution of positive or negative propositions in an argument's premises and conclusion are standardly received as devices of so- called informal logic and critical reasoning. I propose a more exact criterion for distinguishing between formal and informal logic, and then defend a model for fruitful interaction between informal and formal methods of investigating and critically assessing the logic of arguments. *** 1. A Strange Dichotomy In the history of logic a division between formal and informal methods has emerged.
    [Show full text]
  • Advice on the Logic of Argument†
    Revista del Instituto de Filosofía, Universidad de Valparaíso, Año 1, N° 1. Junio 2013. Pags. 7 – 34 Advice on the Logic of Argument† John Woods Resumen Desde su creación moderna a principios de la década de los 70, la lógica informal ha puesto un especial énfasis en el análisis de las falacias y los esquemas de diálogo argumentativo. Desarrollos simultáneos en los círculos que se ocupan de los actos de comunicación de habla exhiben una concentración en el carácter dialéctico de la discusión. PALABRAS CLAVE: Lógica informal, argumento, diálogos Abstract Since its modern inception in the early 1970s, informal logic has placed a special emphasis on the analysis of fallacies and argumentative dialogue schemes. Concurrent developments in speech communication circles exhibit a like concentration on the dialectical character of argument. KEYWORDS: Informal logic, argument, dialogues “But the old connection [of logic] with philosophy is closest to my heart right now . I hope that logic will have another chance in its mother area.” Johan van Benthem “On [the] traditional view of the subject, the phrase ‘formal logic’ is pleonasm and ‘informal logic’ oxymoron.” John Burgess 1. Background remarks Logic began abstractly, as the theoretical core of a general theory of real-life argument. This was Aristotle’s focus in Topics and On Sophistical Refutations and a † Recibido: abril 2013. Aceptado: mayo 2013. The Abductive Systems Group, Department of Philosophy, University of British Columbia 8 / Revista de Humanidades de Valparaíso, Año 1, N° 1 dominant theme of mediaeval dialectic. In our own day, the intellectual skeins that matter for argument-minded logicians are the formal logics of dialogues and games and on the less technical side of the street informal logic.
    [Show full text]
  • Informal Logic
    Document generated on 09/28/2021 9:04 a.m. Informal Logic A Dialectical View on Conduction: Reasons, Warrants, and Normal Suasory Inclinations Shiyang Yu and Frank Zenker Volume 39, Number 1, 2019 Article abstract When Carl Wellman (1971) introduced the reasoning-type conduction, he URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1060809ar endorsed a dialectical view on natural language argumentation. Contemporary DOI: https://doi.org/10.22329/il.v39i1.5080 scholarship, by contrast, treats conductive argument predominantly on a product view. Not only did Wellman’s reasons for a dialectical view thus fall See table of contents into disregard; a product-treatment of conduction also flouts the standard semantics of ‘argument’. Attempting to resolve these difficulties, our paper traces Wellman’s preference for a dialectical view to the role of defeasible Publisher(s) warrants. These act as stand-ins for (parts of) value hierarchies that arguers of normal suasory inclination find acceptable. We also improve on extant ways of Informal Logic diagramming conduction and distinguish two of its structural variants. ISSN 0824-2577 (print) 2293-734X (digital) Explore this journal Cite this article Yu, S. & Zenker, F. (2019). A Dialectical View on Conduction: Reasons, Warrants, and Normal Suasory Inclinations. Informal Logic, 39(1), 32–69. https://doi.org/10.22329/il.v39i1.5080 Copyright (c), 2019 Shiyang Yu, Frank Zenker This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/ This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit.
    [Show full text]
  • Defense of Fallacy Theory
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Scholarship at UWindsor University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor OSSA Conference Archive OSSA 11 May 18th, 9:00 AM - May 21st, 5:00 PM A (Modest) Defense of Fallacy Theory Scott F. Aikin Vanderbilt University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive Part of the Philosophy Commons Aikin, Scott F., "A (Modest) Defense of Fallacy Theory" (2016). OSSA Conference Archive. 92. https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive/OSSA11/papersandcommentaries/92 This Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Conferences and Conference Proceedings at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in OSSA Conference Archive by an authorized conference organizer of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. A Modest Defense of Fallacy Theory SCOTT F. AIKIN Philosophy Vanderbilt University 111 Furman Hall Nashville, TN 37240 USA [email protected] Abstract: Fallacy theory has three significant challenges to it: the generality, scope, and negativity problems. To the generality problem, the connection between general types of bad arguments and tokens is a matter of refining the use of the vocabulary. To the scope problem, the breadth of fallacy’s instances is cause for development. To the negativity problem, fallacy theory must be coordinated with a program of adversariality-management. Keywords: fallacy theory; minimal adversariality 1. Introduction Fallacy theory is the convergence of three broad programs in the study of argument. First is the first-order research program of defining fallacy, taxonomizing and finding new types.
    [Show full text]
  • Introduction to Logic and Critical Thinking
    Introduction to Logic and Critical Thinking Version 1.4 Matthew J. Van Cleave Lansing Community College Introduction to Logic and Critical Thinking by Matthew J. Van Cleave is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. Table of contents Preface Chapter 1: Reconstructing and analyzing arguments 1.1 What is an argument? 1.2 Identifying arguments 1.3 Arguments vs. explanations 1.4 More complex argument structures 1.5 Using your own paraphrases of premises and conclusions to reconstruct arguments in standard form 1.6 Validity 1.7 Soundness 1.8 Deductive vs. inductive arguments 1.9 Arguments with missing premises 1.10 Assuring, guarding, and discounting 1.11 Evaluative language 1.12 Evaluating a real-life argument Chapter 2: Formal methods of evaluating arguments 2.1 What is a formal method of evaluation and why do we need them? 2.2 Propositional logic and the four basic truth functional connectives 2.3 Negation and disjunction 2.4 Using parentheses to translate complex sentences 2.5 “Not both” and “neither nor” 2.6 The truth table test of validity 2.7 Conditionals 2.8 “Unless” 2.9 Material equivalence 2.10 Tautologies, contradictions, and contingent statements 2.11 Proofs and the 8 valid forms of inference 2.12 How to construct proofs 2.13 Short review of propositional logic 2.14 Categorical logic 2.15 The Venn test of validity for immediate categorical inferences 2.16 Universal statements and existential commitment 2.17 Venn validity for categorical syllogisms Chapter 3: Evaluating inductive arguments and probabilistic and statistical fallacies 3.1 Inductive arguments and statistical generalizations 3.2 Inference to the best explanation and the seven explanatory virtues 3.3 Analogical arguments 3.4 Causal arguments 3.5 Probability 3.6 The conjunction fallacy 3.7 The base rate fallacy 3.8 The small numbers fallacy 3.9 Regression to the mean fallacy 3.10 Gambler’s fallacy Chapter 4: Informal fallacies 4.1 Formal vs.
    [Show full text]
  • Informal Logic 25 Years Later the First International Symposium On
    Informal logic 25 years later The First International Symposium on Informal Logic, held on this campus on June 26 to 28, 1978, was a rise to self-consciousness of a newly distinguished sub-field of philosophy. This sub-field differentiated itself through the belief of some philosophy instructors in North American colleges and universities that the traditional introductory logic course was not much good at helping to improve students’ abilities to deal with the arguments they encountered in everyday life and in academic contexts. Courses centred on formal systems–whether the systems of categorical syllogistic and propositional logic done by truth tables or the more comprehensive and up-to-date system of first-order logic–had no relevance to the highly charged debates of the late 1960s and early 1970s about such issues as American military action in Vietnam and the position of women in society. In response, a new kind of textbook began to emerge, often focussed on the informal fallacies, which had been a neglected backwater of the traditional introductory logic course. A pioneer among these textbooks was Howard Kahane’s Logic and Contemporary Rhetoric, subtitled “The Use of Reason in Everyday Life”, the first edition of which was published in 1971 (Kahane 1971); it is now in its ninth edition. Kahane, who gave a paper at the First International Symposium on Informal Logic entitled “The Nature and Classification of Fallacies” (Kahane 1980), died two years ago, on May 2, 2001. The notice of his death in the Proceedings And Addresses of the American Philosophical Association (Hausman et al.
    [Show full text]
  • A Philosophical Examination of Proofs in Mathematics Eric Almeida
    Undergraduate Review Volume 3 Article 13 2007 A Philosophical Examination of Proofs in Mathematics Eric Almeida Follow this and additional works at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/undergrad_rev Part of the Logic and Foundations Commons, and the Logic and foundations of mathematics Commons Recommended Citation Almeida, Eric (2007). A Philosophical Examination of Proofs in Mathematics. Undergraduate Review, 3, 80-84. Available at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/undergrad_rev/vol3/iss1/13 This item is available as part of Virtual Commons, the open-access institutional repository of Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts. Copyright © 2007 Eric Almeida 0 A Philosophical Examination of Proofs in Mathematics Eric Almeida Eric Almeida is a Philosophy Major. This “The purpose of a proof is to understand, not verify”-- Arnold Ross. project was mentored by Dr. Catherine n mathematics, a proof is a demonstration that, given certain axioms, some Womack. statement of interest is necessarily true. Proofs employ logic but usually include some amount of natural language which of course admits some ambiguity. In fact, the vast majority of proofs in written mathematics can be considered as applications of informal logic. The distinction has led to much Iexamination of current and historical mathematical practice, quasi-empiricism in mathematics. One of the concerns with the philosophy of mathematics is the role of language and logic in proofs, and mathematics as a language. Regardless of one’s attitude to formalism, the result that is proved to be true is a theorem; in a completely formal proof it would be the final word, and the complete proof shows how it follows from the axioms alone.
    [Show full text]
  • Inference and Argument in Informal Logic John Hoaglund Christopher Newport University
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Scholarship at UWindsor University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor OSSA Conference Archive OSSA 3 May 15th, 9:00 AM - May 17th, 5:00 PM Inference and argument in informal logic John Hoaglund Christopher Newport University Follow this and additional works at: http://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive Part of the Philosophy Commons Hoaglund, John, "Inference and argument in informal logic" (1999). OSSA Conference Archive. 27. http://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive/OSSA3/papersandcommentaries/27 This Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in OSSA Conference Archive by an authorized conference organizer of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Title: Inference and Argument in Informal Logic Author: John Hoaglund Response to this paper by: Leo Groarke (c) 2000 John Hoaglund If logic isn’t about inference and argument, there doesn’t seem to be much for it to be about at all. So one expects logicians to distinguish the two, or if not, at least to explain why one creature goes by two different names. But they do neither. Formal logicians typically group one set of procedures together and refer to them indifferently as rules of inference or forms of argument. Informal logicians equate inference with the detachment rules of formal logic, which whisks it out of their field of interest. Only Walton1 takes the distinction seriously, unpacking dictionary definitions of the terms and listing sub-varieties of each.
    [Show full text]
  • Perelman, Informal Logic and the Historicity of Reason Christopher Tindale University of Windsor
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Scholarship at UWindsor University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor Philosophy Publications Department of Philosophy 2006 Perelman, Informal Logic and the Historicity of Reason Christopher Tindale University of Windsor Follow this and additional works at: http://scholar.uwindsor.ca/philosophypub Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Tindale, Christopher. (2006). Perelman, Informal Logic and the Historicity of Reason. Informal Logic, 26 (3), 341-357. http://scholar.uwindsor.ca/philosophypub/21 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Philosophy at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Publications by an authorized administrator of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Perelman, Informal Logic and the Historicity of Reason 341 Perelman, Informal Logic and the Historicity of Reason CHRISTOPHER W. TINDALE University of Windsor Abstract: In a posthumous paper, Perelman Résumé: Dans un article posthume discusses his decision to bring his theory of Perelman discute de sa décision de joindre sa argumentation together with rhetoric rather théorie d’argumentation à la rhétorique than calling it an informal logic. This is due plutôt qu’à la logique non formelle. Ceci est in part because of the centrality he gives to dû partiellement à l’importance qu’il accorde audience, and in part because of the negative à l’auditoire, et partiellement à l’attitude attitude that informal logicians have to négative des logiciens non formels à l’égard rhetoric. In this paper, I explore both of these de la rhétorique.
    [Show full text]
  • The Authority of the Fallacies Approach to Argument Evaluation
    The Authority of the Fallacies Approach to Argument Evaluation CATHERINE E. HUNDLEBY Department of Philosophy University of Windsor Windsor, Ontario Canada N9B 3P4 Email: [email protected] Abstract: Popular textbook treat- Resumé: L’approche employée pour ments of the fallacies approach to ar- évaluer des arguments qui repose sur gument evaluation employ the Adver- l’identification de sophismes qu’on sary Method identified by Janice trouve dans les manuels populaires est Moulton (1983) that takes the goal of une Méthode de l’Adversaire, identi- argumentation to be the defeat of other fiée par Janice Moulton (1983). Le but arguments and that narrows the terms de cette méthode est de vaincre les of discourse in order to facilitate such arguments des autres et de borner les defeat. My analysis of the textbooks termes d’un discours pour faciliter shows that the Adversary Method op- leurs défaites. Mon analyse des erates as a Kuhnian paradigm in phi- manuels démontre que la Méthode de losophy, and demonstrates that the l’Adversaire agit comme un para- popular fallacies pedagogy is authori- digme Kuhn en philosophie, et que la tarian in being unresponsive to the pédagogie populaire des sophismes est scholarly developments in informal autoritaire puisqu’elle n’applique pas logic and argumentation theory. A les résultats des progrès académiques progressive evolution for the fallacies de la logique non formelle et de la approach is offered as an authoritative théorie d’argumentation. On offre une alternative. évolution progressive de l’approche des sophismes comme une alternative légitime. Key words: adversary, argument, authority, epistemology, fallacy, feminism, pedagogy, paradigm, silence, textbook 1.
    [Show full text]
  • Are There Methods of Informal Logic?
    University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor OSSA Conference Archive OSSA 9 May 18th, 9:00 AM - May 21st, 5:00 PM Are there methods of informal logic? Hans V. Hansen University of Windsor Daniel H. Cohen Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive Part of the Philosophy Commons Hansen, Hans V. and Cohen, Daniel H., "Are there methods of informal logic?" (2011). OSSA Conference Archive. 15. https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/ossaarchive/OSSA9/papersandcommentaries/15 This Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Conferences and Conference Proceedings at Scholarship at UWindsor. It has been accepted for inclusion in OSSA Conference Archive by an authorized conference organizer of Scholarship at UWindsor. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Are there methods of informal logic?1 HANS V. HANSEN Department of Philosophy University of Windsor Windsor, ON Canada N9B 3P4 [email protected] ABSTRACT: This presentation seeks to understand informal logic as a set of methods for the logical evaluation of natural language arguments. Some of the methods identified are the fallacies method, deductivism, warrantism and argument schemes. A framework for comparing the adequacy of the methods is outlined consisting of the following categories: learner- and user-efficiency, subjective and objective reliability, and scope. Within this framework, it is also possible to compare informal and formal logic. KEYWORDS: logic, illative evaluation, conceptual standard, operational standard, methods, reliability, efficiency, scope 1. INTRODUCTION Imagine that you have received a grant to study the argumentation surrounding a topic of current interest, the arguments about whether there should be unrestricted building of energy-producing windmills, for example, or whether your country should be involved in an overseas war, or whether we should eat genetically modified foods.
    [Show full text]